Not content with firing patent suits at tech rivals, Apple's lawyers have forced a baby clothes retailer to halt sales of items styled on the iPod and iPhone user interfaces and icons.
The US giant is fiercely protective of its brand image, having spent millions of dollars on marketing its kit to shiny loving IT professionals …

Just stomping on bad taste ...

Hardly surprising

This is hardly surprising coming from Apple. They're the same company who brought a law case for a paper notepad that resembled an iPhone design on the grounds that their consumers may get confused with the branding.

If Apple think their customers could get confused between an over priced mobile phone and a $2 paper notepad then what does this say about the average intelligence of their customers??

You'd think, but you'd be so very wrong. Some of the people I know who are the most susceptible to any advertsing/marketing are also the most intelligent and otherwise hard-nosed business people. Some of them work in IT.

I was referring to.....

"Rather than forcing the retailer to bin the iOS garb, surely Apple execs should be encouraging hapless parents to indoctrinate their children in the ergonomic designs of its iToys before they can even talk?"

Correct, but only after Apple receives their standard 30% cut. THAT is why they are objecting.

....

This is about copyright, not patents.

The accused's mocked-up "iPhone" image does at least look different enough that it probably shouldn't be considered infringement, but that "iPod click wheel" T-shirt design is just a blatant rip-off of the original and certainly *does* fall under copyright infringement. Frankly, it's surprising they got away with it for even this long.

"ipopmybaby.com" don't have a legal leg to stand on and completely deserve this. What the hell were they thinking? Apple have _never_ made any secret of their intentions to protect their brands and designs.

@technohead95, etc.: seriously? You're calling _Apple_ out? Copyright laws exist for a reason. You don't get to blame Apple for using them in cases like these, when the infringement is so bloody blatant.

Why The Register even thinks this is news escapes me: it's just Apple doing what it is legally obligated to do by US IP laws. It's not as if they have any real choice.

I suppose before we bitch about Apple in this instance we should spare a moment to consider what would happen if someone tried to sell outfits with the olympic rings, fifa logo's or man united logos on them without paying your dues.

not quite the same

whereas the stripey apple logo is certainly protected, as is e.g. the olympic logo.

I doubt that a photo of an olympic athlete on the podium with the logo showing would be considered an infringement but on the podium without the logo would get laughed out of court. That's a closer analogy to what Apple's up to this time.

I would at this point attach a photo on my wall light switch but as the design is property of MK electrical, subsidiary of Honeywell, maybe best not...

Copyright ?

If you actually take the trouble to look at these baby clothes, the link was provided, you'll be hard pushed to find an Apple logo, which is the trademarked thing here (NOT copyright). Simply having an image of a smartphone on the t-shirt, or as in most cases, a generic mp3 player control dial, how does that offend Apple ?

There's nothing 'generic' about that iPod click wheel graphic.

The Apple logo's trademark status is utterly irrelevant. This is not about a trademark violation. (And trademark status is independent from copyright status anyway. Copyright is *automatic*. You don't have to apply or register a damned thing.)